listen to your (he)art
by rollythejoger
Summary: Clarke never expected to see her crush from the coffeeshop at her art show. Bellamy definitely wasn't expecting to see a statue that looked just like him.


Clarke is setting up for her community painting class when she startles at the sound of her ringtone chiming from across the studio. She scrambles to reach for her phone, but disappointedly realizes that it's just a telemarketer.

She's been teaching community art classes for the last year- as it turns out, the "starving artist" myth is very true: four years and one art degree later, and she's barely scraping by to pay her rent.

This last month, though, she's been begging the community center supervisor to let her use the center for a showcase. But, for as much schmoozing as she's done, it's less than two weeks away from the weekend she's been asking for and she's still waiting on confirmation from Marcus.

Having a show could really change things for her. If she could finally sell more of her pieces she might be able to finally save up enough to rent her own personal studio...

She's still fixating on her lack of confirmation about next weekend when the first of her students walks into the room, so puts down the phone and lets her teaching distract her from her stress.

* * *

Two hours later the last of her students has finally left the studio, and she's free to go out and do some sketching.

She's about finished packing up her things when she hears her phone go off again. Taking a deep breath, she pulls it out of her bag and glances down at the screen.

Marcus Kane is calling .

Clarke lets out a long exhale of breath, willing herself to sound calm and professional as she answers the call.

"Hello Marcus, how are you?"

She thinks she can hear a smile in his voice when he responds, "I'm doing well Clarke, I'm calling to update you about the availability of the community center."

She waits for him to continue, but apparently he wants to make this suspenseful because he doesn't say anything for several seconds, and god that's really not what she needs right now, so she prompts him.

"And…? Is it going to work out?"

This time, she knows that she can hear a smile in his voice when he says, "I'm happy to say that we are going to be able to let you use the center for your art show; now we'll have to work out some paperwork.."

In the end the phone call lasts 10 more minutes while they hammer out details and plan a meeting to sign all the necessary paperwork, but it isn't really a chore- not when it's for the event that can finally put her on track.

When they've finally hung up, Clarke heads over to her favorite coffee shop and bookstore, the Dropship, which is only a few blocks away.

She's about halfway there when she remembers that she's not the only one who's been waiting to hear about the community center. Grabbing her phone, she pulls up the contact information for Lincoln Woods and calls him, knowing that she finally can give him the answer they've been waiting on.

"Hey Lincoln!" She greets, and hears his warm chuckle in response.

"Hello Clarke, how are you? You sound like you're in a good mood?"

"Mhmm," she agrees, "I just got off the phone with Marcus." She pauses, overcome with excitement for a moment, "He's letting me use the community center next weekend!"

* * *

Lincoln is still smiling when he hangs up the phone and turns to his fiancé, who's looking at him curiously.

"Was that Clarke?" She asks.

He nods, "Marcus finally agreed to let her use the community center for her art show next weekend."

"Good for her!" Octavia squeals excitedly and pulls out her phone.

"I'm gonna invite Bell," she informs him with a mischievous look.

"Okay..? Why do you look like you're scheming?" He prods, to which she only smirks.

"It's the perfect opportunity to finally introduce Bell to Clarke!" She explains, and continues when he raises an unimpressed eyebrow, "Oh come on, we've talked about what a great match they'd make!"

And they have discussed it before, actually: Octavia's brother and his friend from art school- but neither of them seem particularly open to matchmaking, and Lincoln can't imagine that Clarke would want any distractions during her first real show.

He's just about to try to persuade Octavia to wait for another time when he sees that she's already called up her brother, holding her phone to her ear, and so he just rolls his eyes at his overly eager fiancé.

* * *

A few minutes after getting off the phone with Lincoln, Clarke finally arrives at the Dropship. Pushing open the doors, she watches as the owner's familiar flop of dark hair pops up behind the counter. He pushes up the thick, black rims of his glasses and starts typing her order into the register.

"Hey princess, how's it going?"

"Hey! Maybe I wanted something different today!"

He cocks an eyebrow at her, unimpressed, and hands the mug over to the other barista, Miller, at the espresso machine.

"Okay fine, I want my usual," she relents, "and my day has been surprisingly good, how about you?"

He smirks at her, "Well my day is certainly better now that you're here."

A faint blush lights up her cheeks, but she only shrugs at the amused snort that Miller gives them- she'd be more embarrassed if it weren't like this every time she comes by. Honestly, she doesn't even know the owner's name, and she's pretty sure he doesn't know hers. He's never asked, actually, and she usually pays with cash, so he's always just called her 'princess' while flirting relentlessly.

And it's not like she minds, obviously- she always comes back to his shop for a reason.

So she just rolls her eyes at the cute owner, with his perfect freckles and his stupidly messy hair, and leans up against the counter to watch Miller finish up her drink.

* * *

Bellamy always loves it when the sassy blonde artist visits his shop. He can remember the first time she came in, a flurry of blonde hair with an easy air of confidence. She was covered with paint splotches on her shirt and ink stains on her fingers, and after getting her drink she'd promptly planted herself in the corner armchair and started drawing in a sketchbook.

He'd tried to get a look at it, he remembers, going over under the guise of grabbing her empty pastry plate and trying to get a look at her work- but there was no inconspicuous way of sneaking a glance.

She'd been coming in at least once a week since then; always sticking with her soy latte but switching up her pastry of choice- per Bellamy's recommendations, of course. It always delighted him when she asked him what treat she should get that day, and he took great pride in coming up with new selections with his chef, Monty, for each week.

About a half hour after the princess's arrival, Bellamy notices that the shop is fairly dead. Miller's doing something in the back and the five or six customers are all situated comfortably with their drinks, so he grabs a seat behind the register and pulls out his phone.

One missed call from Octavia Blake. One voicemail from Octavia Blake.

He glances around to make sure the customers still look comfortable before placing the phone at his ear with the volume low.

"Hey Bell! One of Lincoln's friends is having an art show next weekend and we're gonna go be supportive! You should come too, if you don't have plans…"

There's a pause, and Bellamy can hear his sister giggling.

"Who am I kidding, we both know you don't have plans. So I'll have Lincoln text you the details- maybe we can grab dinner ahead of time? Anyways, love you, talk to you soon!"

Brat, he thinks affectionately, and opens up a message.

Maybe you should consider that I might not want to go to an art show with you and your inappropriately older fianc é.

He sends it, but then also types out a string of emojis to make sure she knows that he's not trying to start a fight with her about Lincoln's age- god knows they've already had that argument enough.

Bellamy's phone buzzes almost immediately and he grins when he sees that Octavia has sent a selfie of herself mid eye-roll, along with the message: so I'll tell Lincoln that you're coming and we'll get a reservation for dinner beforehand.

* * *

A week or so later, Bellamy is walking into the community center, surprisedly taking in all the changes to the normal decor. This Clarke girl really did the place over: her paintings covering the walls and sculptures littering the floor in what is a clearly strategic placement.

He turns to Lincoln, "Your friend did all this? She's really talented."

Lincoln smiles proudly back at him, "Clarke is amazing. She's worked hard this last year and it's good that she's finally getting the recognition she deserves."

Bellamy watches as Octavia looks around, presumably for the artist herself. She must catch sight of her, because her eyes light up, but then she says, "it looks like Clarke's a little busy talking to potential buyers right now- let's look around and catch up with her later."

So they make their way around the room, making sure to give each piece the adequate time and respect it deserves, and it's honestly much more fun than Bellamy expected. Clarke is a really good artist. They've almost made their way around the entire center when Octavia stops abruptly.

"Huh." She makes a noise of surprise.

"What?" Bellamy asks, as he and Lincoln turn to her curiously.

"Don't you think that statue… kinda looks like you, Bell?"

Intrigued, Bellamy looks at the statue in question to see that there are some resemblances. But that's crazy- he doesn't even know this girl- there's no way that this it's supposed to be him.

"And look at that scar! It's exactly like yours," Octavia points out.

And yeah, actually, it is.

Why the hell is there a statue of him at this show? He looks to his future brother-in-law, ready to question him about Clarke, when Lincoln's face lights up and he calls out, "Clarke! Hey!"

So Bellamy turns around, eager to finally see the artist that seemingly took it upon herself to sculpt a statue of him, and is shocked to see his princess from the coffee shop.

* * *

Only halfway into the show, Clarke is delighted to have already talked to five different buyers. Five. The night is going perfectly, somehow even better than she ever could have hoped, and she's excited when she spots Lincoln and Octavia across the room.

She's almost all the way over to them when she sees Lincoln notice her, calling out a greeting, "Clarke! Hey!"

He quickly pulls her into a hug and then releases her so she can turn to Octavia, who's smirking at her.

"The show is amazing, Clarke, you've done a great job!"

Clarke smiles broadly and reaches out to pulls her into a hug too, grateful for her support. As she's pulling away Octavia makes eye contact and winks conspicuously.

"We were a little unsure about one of your pieces though, I think my brother Bellamy wanted to ask you about it."

Clarke smiles, excited to finally meet the infamous Bellamy that Octavia is always going on about when she turns to face him and... oh.

Oh no.

He's looking at her with a surprised expression, which- is fair enough, considering he's standing in front of a statue that was made to be exactly like him.

"Oh my god." She laments, feeling her face go crimson.

That seems to bring him out of his surprised stupor though, and he gives her his signature smirk, "Hey, Princess. It's nice to finally see some of your work."

Clarke see that Octavia and Lincoln are looking curiously at them after his comment, wondering how they know each other, probably.

Bellamy seems to notice their reactions as well, and explains, "Clarke is a regular at the coffee shop- she comes in and does sketching all the time." He shoots her a wicked smile, "Now, if I had realized that I was modeling during all your visits I probably would have charged an extra fee…"

"Oh my god," she hears herself repeating.

And, well, it's not like she set out to make a statue of the hot barista from her favorite coffee shop. Honestly, she really didn't. But she did decide to start a male statue a few months ago, which she sculpted piece by piece, and it wasn't until it was complete that she realized it all summed up to the cute coffee guy. It had been a little embarrassing, at the time, when she'd realized that she had subconsciously sculpted her crush- but it's not like he'd ever see it, she'd reasoned with herself.

But of course he's Octavia's brother and of course he's here at her show and of course he's already seen the statue.

Nice going Griffin, she thinks, you showed your crush the fucking shrine you built of him.

Octavia's watching the pair of them with a shit-eating grin, "Wait, Clarke you seriously sculpted this to look like my brother?" She asks, not even trying to disguise her glee.

Clarke tries to think of an excuse, but what is there to say? No, Octavia, I didn't mean to sculpt your brother, but I was working on the hands and forearms of my piece and then I remembered how nice your brother's hands were from all the times he's made me coffee and then I started fantasizing about how nice the rest of him is, too, and that somehow turned into me sculpting his exact likeness?

So, like the mature adult she is, she covers her face with her hands and lets out a groan, wondering if it's possible to die of humiliation.

* * *

Bellamy watches Clarke cover her face and feels a twinge of regret for his teasing because, well, it's not like he's upset with the way the evening has gone. The cute artist that he makes a point of flirting with has made a sculpture of him. A very flattering sculpture too- if he does say so himself. So he reaches out and gently pulls her hands from her face.

"Hey, Clarke? You're an amazing artist."

She makes a small noise of disbelief, and Bellamy feels his grin grow wider. God, she's adorable.

"No really. I mean... it clearly helps that you had such an amazing muse, but…" He trails off as she lets out a groan and smacks him.

"Oh whatever, Bellamy." She says, but the blush on her face starts to fade, and he thinks his joke fulfilled its purpose of easing her embarrassment.

It's at this point that he hears Lincoln laughing, and he turns to him for an explanation, but Lincoln is looking straight at Clarke when he says, "I had no idea that Bellamy was your barista crush."

Clarke sighs a little, "Clearly neither did I."

Octavia giggles at that and Bellamy whips his head back to the artist.

"You have a crush on me?" He asks, disbelieving, and Clarke looks back at him from under her lashes.

"No, I sculpt all my baristas just for the hell of it." She snarks.

He lets out a snort at that, but then takes in the rosy hue that's begun filling her cheeks again. She really does have a crush on him, he realizes.

"Yeah, so like how I go out of the way to make latte art for all my customers. I definitely don't just put those hearts on your drinks only." He jokes, and is delighted when she laughs, but he's distracted from any further possible attempts at charm by the sound of Octavia gagging.

"Okay, not that I didn't want to set you both up, but that's enough flirting in front of me, thanks." She says, but she's grinning at them and so is Lincoln.

"You guys were trying to set us up?" Clarke asks.

Lincoln nods but points out, "Not that you needed our help apparently." To which Clarke lets out a boisterous peal of laughter.

"Oh yeah, who needs a mutual friend to set you up with your crush when you can just sculpt a life-size replica of them to let them know you're interested?"


End file.
